Gomez Looks to Defend IRONMAN 70.3 World Champion Title in Port Elizabeth

August 28, 2018

The reigning champ hopes to make history this weekend by winning his third IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship title.

It’s been a season of firsts for Javier Gómez. He finished his first full IRONMAN at the IRONMAN Asia-Pacific Championship in June, punched his ticket to Kona for the first time, and he’s gearing up for what he hopes will be the first of many IRONMAN world titles. But before he can take care of that, the most decorated athlete in the history of the sport wants to make it a weekend of thirds—as in winning his third IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship in Nelson Mandela Bay, South Africa.

The eight-time world champion wrapped up his final block of hard training last week in his hometown of Pontevedra, Spain, alongside ITU pro Pablo Dapena. He traveled to South Africa over the weekend and is now resting up for what he hopes will be a successful defense of the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship title he won last year in Chattanooga. Sebastian Kienle and Michael Raelert are the only two men to have won back-to-back IRONMAN 70.3 world titles, but Gómez is seeking to become the first ever to win this race three times. If he does, it’ll make nine total world titles for a man who is already considered one of the greatest triathletes of all time (he has also has five ITU world titles at one XTERRA world title).

It’s been a busy season for the 35-year-old, and the first year that he’s focused exclusively on longer distance racing. His IRONMAN debut in Cairns in June was a spectacular one—he finished in under eight hours—but did not result in victory after Kiwi Braden Currie out-dueled him on the marathon to win by less than two minutes.

"I was very happy with my [IRONMAN] debut," Gómez told Spanish radio show "El Larguero" last week. "With that time I would’ve won just about any race in the world, but I had a very tough opponent who was better than me on that day. That makes you think more about the mistakes I made so I can try to improve for Hawaii."

Before he can face a stacked field in Kona, he'll face an equally loaded one on Sunday in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. While this year's field will include a slew of former world championship podium finishers, most eyes will be on IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship rookie Alistair Brownlee, who has been one of Gómez's greatest rivals for the past decade. The two-time Olympic gold medalist got the better of Gómez at the 2012 London Games (Gómez won the silver medal) and the Brit has made his intentions clear that he'd also like to win Kona in the near future. While 30-year-old Brownlee has youth—and perhaps a little more top-end run speed—on his side, he's still a relative newcomer to IRONMAN 70.3 racing and has battled injuries since winning his second Olympic gold in 2016. But he's nearly impossible to beat when he's on form, as he showed at his IRONMAN 70.3 debut last year in St. George, where he bested Lionel Sanders to win the North American title.

Sanders is sitting out this year's IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship to focus all his effort on Kona, as is two-time winner and two-time runner-up Sebastian Kienle. The 2015 IRONMAN 70.3 world champ Jan Frodeno will be toeing the line in South Africa, and he should feel right at home, as it’s where he spent much of his childhood. Frodeno has plenty of experience battling both Gómez and Brownlee, and got the better of both of them en route to winning the 2008 Olympic gold medal.

Last year's runner-up, Ben Kanute, doesn't bring quite the same short-course resume to IRONMAN 70.3, but after a breakthrough race in Chattanooga last year, it appears the American über biker has found his ideal distance. Kanute led last year's world championship through eight miles of the run before being passed by a surging Gómez. He’s focused his entire season on moving one step up the podium, and will be one of just four American men competing in South Africa this weekend.

The men's race will take place on Sunday, September 2, one day after the world's fastest women take center stage. The top 10 men and women will claim a share of a $250,000 prize purse, while a total of 4,500 age-group men and women will compete for the chance to become an IRONMAN 70.3 world champion.